The Book of Luke: We Have Seen Strange Things Today (Luke 5:12-26)
In the first 11 verses of Luke 5, we see the call of Jesus to launch out into the deep. Here we are going to see 3 miracles from Jesus and lessons that we can learn from these miracles.
Luke 5:12 “12 And it came to pass, when he was in a certain city, behold a man full of leprosy: who seeing Jesus fell on his face, and besought him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.”. Firstly we see a depiction of salvation. When we see the Lord Jesus Christ heal this man of leprosy, it is a depiction of what salvation is like.
The first thing we see is a depiction of a sinner. In the Bible, leprosy is a picture of sin and a leprous man is a depiction of a sinner. Definition of leprosy – Hansen’s disease (also known as leprosy) is an infection caused by slow-growing bacteria called Mycobacterium leprae. It can affect the nerves, skin, eyes, and lining of the nose (nasal mucosa). With early diagnosis and treatment, the disease can be cured. However, if left untreated it can cause blindness.
We see this very serious disease of leprosy and even some people today have this disease. We notice that throughout the Bible, leprosy is a picture of sin. The healing of leprosy is a picture of the healing of sin. The most famous passage on leprosy is probably Leviticus 13. We studied how leprosy was a picture of sin in that chapter.
Let me give you 5 ways leprosy pictures sin as found in Leviticus 13. #1 – Sin like leprosy takes root below the surface. #2 – Sin like leprosy starts small and spreads. #3 – Sin like leprosy displays your raw flesh. #4 – Sin like leprosy isolates you. #5 – Sin like leprosy needs to be dealt with in fire. Leprosy is a picture of sin and a leprous man is a picture of a sinner.
Not only do we see the depiction of a sinner but we see the depiction of the Savior. Luke 5:12 “12 And it came to pass, when he was in a certain city, behold a man full of leprosy: who seeing Jesus fell on his face, and besought him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. 13 And he put forth his hand, and touched him,….”. Now when you read this passage, you could quickly read over this without thinking about it. We can imagine those around that were watching this were probably shocked. Touching someone who is leprous could cause the disease to spread to you. People that were leprous were supposed to be isolated in the old world before they had ways to treat it.
Luke 13:43-45 “43 Then the priest shall look upon it: and, behold, if the rising of the sore be white reddish in his bald head, or in his bald forehead, as the leprosy appeareth in the skin of the flesh; 44 He is a leprous man, he is unclean: the priest shall pronounce him utterly unclean; his plague is in his head. 45 And the leper in whom the plague is, his clothes shall be rent, and his head bare, and he shall put a covering upon his upper lip, and shall cry, Unclean, unclean.”. When you were diagnosed with leprosy, you were to spend the rest of your life separated. You were obligated to cry out unclean to let people know that you are unclean and that people should keep their distance from you. Jesus does the opposite because he doesn’t avoid him but he actually touches him. This is the depiction of the Savior.
Hebrews 4:14 “14 Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. 15 For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.”. Jesus reached out and touched this man. The Bible tells us that we have a high priest that was able to experience these things.
Put yourself in this position. Here is a leprous man that is not allowed to come near anybody. He doesn’t have much contact with the outside world. Everyone is avoiding him and no one has touched him. This would be a very depressing thing for an individual. Whatever you are going through tonight, whether it is a sin or people have lied about you or you’ve been hurt by someone, you do have the Lord Jesus Christ who wants to reach out and touch you tonight.
Not only do we see the depiction of a sinner and the Savior but also of salvation. Luke 5:12 “12 And it came to pass, when he was in a certain city, behold a man full of leprosy: who seeing Jesus fell on his face, and besought him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.”. The word “besought” or “beseech” means to ask earnestly. The Bible says “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved”. Here we have the sinner calling upon the Lord for salvation. Luke 5:13 “13 And he put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will: be thou clean. And immediately the leprosy departed from him.”. This is a picture of salvation.
2nd Peter 3:9 “9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.”. I’m here to tell you that Calvinism is a lie. This idea that there are some people that God doesn’t want to save is heresy. We understand that you can cross a line with God where it is too late but Jesus died for everyone and he wants people to change their belief and place it on Jesus.
Luke 5:12 “12 And it came to pass, when he was in a certain city, behold a man full of leprosy: who seeing Jesus fell on his face, and besought him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.”. John 5:24 “24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.”. Salvation happens immediately or straightway. It happened in a moment. You went from in the womb to out of the womb in a moment.
Luke 5:14 “14 And he charged him to tell no man: but go, and shew thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing, according as Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.”. He tells him to follow the steps you are to take after being healed by leprosy. I’d imagine this is the first person cured from leprosy since Naaman. Probably no one actually went to the priest to state they had been cleansed from leprosy. There were requirements and sacrifices necessary if you had been cleansed from leprosy.
Luke 5:15 “15 But so much the more went there a fame abroad of him: and great multitudes came together to hear, and to be healed by him of their infirmities. 16 And he withdrew himself into the wilderness, and prayed.”. Here we see the humanity of Christ. Jesus was 100% God but he was also 100% man. As a result, he required rest. If Jesus needed to take time away to pray then obviously we do also.
The first lesson we saw was a picture of salvation. Now we will look at a miracle that shows the determination of soulwinners. Luke 5:17 “17 And it came to pass on a certain day, as he was teaching, that there were Pharisees and doctors of the law sitting by, which were come out of every town of Galilee, and Judaea, and Jerusalem: and the power of the Lord was present to heal them.”. The power of the Lord was there to heal this Pharisees and doctors of the law. The power of the Lord was just as present there to heal them as anyone else. If they had the right attitude then they could have been healed also.
Did you know there are people that make it a point to listen to every sermon I preach just to try to catch me in something that I say wrong. They don’t listen to grow and learn but they could be helped if they had the right attitude. The Pharisees and doctors of the law are sitting there not being helped while there are people not sitting there that do get helped which can’t help themselves. Luke 5:18 “18 And, behold, men brought in a bed a man which was taken with a palsy: and they sought means to bring him in, and to lay him before him.”. Here we have a crippled man that can’t get to Jesus. This crippled man had people that cared about him. We see the determination of the soulwinners. His friends bring him to Jesus. They did this because they cared about this man.
Soulwinning requires compassion. It requires people that actually care. We have men who are not crippled and do not require healing. They have compassion though and bring someone who does need help. In Luke 5 we have a crippled man who needs help and people help him. However, in John 5 we have a crippled man who does not have people who care enough to help him. John 5:4-7 “4 For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. 5 And a certain man was there, which had an infirmity thirty and eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lie, and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he saith unto him, Wilt thou be made whole?
This is the question that we as soulwinners ask. “Wilt thou be made whole?”. Look at the heartbreaking response in verse 7 “7 The impotent man answered him, Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me.”. I wonder how many spiritually crippled people here in Sacramento who if someone would just show up and bring them to Jesus would be healed. How many would cry out “I have no man who cares. I have no man who wants to help. I have no man who wants to take the time or give up a few hours on a Saturday or a Thursday afternoon or Sunday. They are healed and on their way to heaven but won’t take the time for me.”.
Verse 8 “8 Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk.”. The Bible tells us to have compassion and make a difference to people. It takes some compassion to roll out of bed and take the time to care about someone other than ourselves. Someone cared enough about you to carry you to Jesus. People say they are too tired or too busy or too stressed. All of us are busy and tired and stressed. However, there are people dying and going to hell every week and they need us to help.
Not only does soulwinning require compassion but also ingenuity. Luke 5:18 “18 And, behold, men brought in a bed a man which was taken with a palsy: and they sought means to bring him in, and to lay him before him.”. If we are going to reach people with the gospel then we will need to seek means to do it. As time grows, our Church might have to make some changes to reach people. Soulwinning can require ingenuity. We have had some methods we had to come up with to get the job done. Obviously we go out 2 by 2 and go door to door and that will never change. However, we are in the northern part of Sacramento but there are zip codes in the southern area that are a little harder to get to. We have to have some ingenuity to reach south sac. Why do we put sermons on YouTube and online? To reach more people. The “Banned not Bound” requires some ingenuity to get the message out. We won’t sit here and complain but will find ways to get the man on the bed to Jesus.
A couple years ago we were sending material to inmates in prison. We decided to come up with a system and now hundreds of people on a weekly basis are getting transcribed sermons from us. Every week we get some letters from the inmates that are thanking us for the sermons and how it is changing their lives. This is why we have Church plants in the Philippines – to reach more people. This is why we have the Mission Trips and send the mailers to various zip codes. We do everything we can to reach people with the gospel.
Just last night I told my wife that I had a new idea. I got this vision of our Church sending a yearly or bi-yearly or even quarterly newsletter to all of Natomas with practical things about marriage and finance. This was a new idea that I had and I will talk to the staff about them to see if we are able to do this. Why did we start the Red-Hot Preaching Conference where people are coming from all over the country and world? To promote fundamentalism. We will do whatever we can to promote the word of God and knock doors and send letters.
Soulwinning requires compassion, ingenuity but also sacrifice. Luke 5:19 “19 And when they could not find by what way they might bring him in because of the multitude, they went upon the housetop, and let him down through the tiling with his couch into the midst before Jesus.”. Jesus is teaching in a house and it is packed and there is no way to bring this man to Jesus. They don’t give up though. They go to the housetop and let him down through the top into the midst before Jesus. They destroy the roof to bring him down into the house, through the ceiling. Soulwinning requires sacrifice because that house had to get broken up. Some of you need to break some things up in your schedule.
Fourthly, soulwinning requires faith. Luke 5:20 “20 And when he saw their faith, he said unto him, Man, thy sins are forgiven thee.”. “Their faith” is referring to the men who brought this crippled man to Jesus. We need soulwinners that have the attitude “Whatever it takes.”. We need to make sure that every sin crippled man in this city is a Luke 5 cripple with lots of people to help rather than a John 5 cripple with no one to help.
Last lesson, let us see the deity of the Savior. Luke 5:20 “20 And when he saw their faith, he said unto him, Man, thy sins are forgiven thee.”. I’m sure these men were disappointed when Jesus said this. They wanted this man to be healed but Jesus emphasizes the spiritual over the physical. Jesus would not have been out there feeding the homeless but preaching the gospel. Jesus looks past this man’s physical need and looks at the spiritual need. Luke 5:21 “21 And the scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, Who is this which speaketh blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?”. This was said in their heart but not out loud. The scribes and Pharisees were not wrong. Only God can forgive sins. That is true. However, Jesus was God. That is what they did not believe. Some of us were taught that a priest could forgive your sins but the truth is that only God can forgive sins. 1st Timothy 2:5 “5 For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;”. We can go directly to God to have our sins forgiven.
Luke 5:22 “22 But when Jesus perceived their thoughts, he answering said unto them, What reason ye in your hearts? 23 Whether is easier, to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Rise up and walk? 24 But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power upon earth to forgive sins, (he said unto the sick of the palsy,) I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy couch, and go into thine house. 25 And immediately he rose up before them, and took up that whereon he lay, and departed to his own house, glorifying God.”. The scribes and Pharisees weren’t wrong about God but were wrong about Jesus. They didn’t realize that Jesus was God.
1st Timothy 3:16 “16 And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.”. Jesus was God in human flesh. He was able to forgive sins because he is God. Jesus accepted worship from people because he is God. 1st John 5:20 “20 And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.”. This verse shows us that Jesus is the true God.
Luke 5:26 “26 And they were all amazed, and they glorified God, and were filled with fear, saying, We have seen strange things to day.”. These people saw this whole event and they said that they were strange things. Let me tell you something. If you and I get serious about soulwinning, compassion, sacrifices and doing what we are supposed to do then people will say “We have seen strange things.”. This is strange to the world. What you and I have here today is strange to the world but glorifying to God.
Let’s pray.